Country Images Magazine Derby Edition June 2017 | Page 24

D e r b y s h i re -
Lost Houses
1723, there was no evidence that he designed
Shallcross Hall, nor on close inspection does
it have anything but a passing resemblance to
Ditchley. However, as Derby Cathedral was
actually built by Francis Smith of Warwick
(who was also the contractor at Ditchley) there
is some congruence with his work, although a
close inspection of the surviving photographic
evidence suggests that the house was probably
only infl uenced by his oeuvre and was actually
put up by some competent Manchester builder
using Gibbs’s Book of Architecture (1728) which
contains, as plate 63, a plan for just such a house
with pavilions on curved wings.
Before Shallcross was built, though, Smith had
24 | CountryImagesMagazine.co.uk